Cinco de Maelstrom
Monday, May 24th, 2010Author Mike Rough
If you follow current events as they unfold like me you are probably aware of the coverage regarding the Cinco de Mayo U.S. Flag incident at Live Oak High School in Morgan Hills California. While I tend to view content coming from mainstream media with several buckets of salt this incident has been repeatedly posted in the headline news section of cnn.com with commentary written by Ruben Navarrette of the SanDiego Union-Tribune.
What got my attention was Mr. Navarrette’s focus on the students who wore the American flag on Cinco de Mayo day at the Live Oak High School. Not only did he completely malign the five students:
“When five students at Live Oak High School in Morgan Hill, California, taunted Latino students by wearing T-shirts bearing the American flag on Cinco de Mayo, even though administrators had told students beforehand not to wear flag clothing that day, they caused a ruckus, divided a community and reignited the culture wars. And, it turns out, they were just getting warmed up. The ruckus ensued when Assistant Principal Miguel Rodriguez — apparently fearing that the boys’ fashion choices might provoke a violent response from Latino students who have developed an emotional attachment to the faux holiday as “their day” — told the youths to either turn their T-shirts inside out or go home.” Source Ruben Navarrette CNN
I was shocked to see no mention of community outrage or any response at all by the Latino people of Morgan Hills. It took a little digging to find the information but when I did the article of Mr. Navarrette took on a whole new dimension.
What Navarrette avoids completely is the over the top response by the “Mexican-American” students and other members of the local Latino community:
“A firestorm of outrage erupted online and moved to the streets when about 200 Hispanic students walked out of Live Oak and Ann Sobrato high schools to march through Morgan Hill demonstrating their support for Mexico.
Mexican-American students felt the students were being disrespectful on the only day they celebrate their heritage while students sporting red, white and blue said it violated their First Amendment rights.
The group – mostly high school students – walked out of school this morning after the story of four students who were sent home because they wore American flag T-shirts went viral on TV and online. Many wear red, white and green and two large Mexico flags can be seen at the front of the line.
“It’s disrespectful to do it on Cinco de Mayo,” said Jessica Cortez, a Live Oak sophomore. “They can be a patriot on some other day. Not that specific day.” Source Lindsay Bryant Morgan Hills Times
The last statement made by Jessica Cortez is extremely disturbing as she is representative of her generation and their lack of understanding of the importance of being a patriot every day.
“Hispanic students felt that students wearing American flags were disrespecting the Mexican-American students on Cinco de Mayo – the only day that they celebrate their Mexican heritage.
The students say they want people to know they’re proud of their heritage and they believe wearing red, white and blue on Cinco de Mayo is disrespectful.
Many of the students are from Live Oak High School, who left school around 11 a.m. this morning and decided to march to the school district headquarters just north of Tennant Avenue. When they arrived, they were told to leave.” Source Lindsay Bryant Morgan Hills Times
As of this date no students were suspended for either wearing the U.S. Flag or leaving school without permission. I find this fact unbelievable. Let’s see you have, skipping school, causing a public disturbance, marching without a permit, incitement, desecration of the flag, and a host of other offenses that were not reported or caught on camera.
“We did this to support the Latino-Hispanic community,” said Francine Roa, who graduated from Live Oak in 2005. She brought her 2-year-old son, Elias Martinez, on the march.” Source Lindsay Bryant Morgan Hills Times
She said it’s a peaceful march to support Mexican-Americans in Morgan Hill. The evidence however shows otherwise:
A wheelchair bound man being bullied takes a Mexican flag from a taunter and is sworn at and pushed around.
Several cars were observed during the march donning American flags on the beds of their trucks or from open windows driving repeatedly around the crowd.
The teens responded by yelling “Give us respect!” but some screamed obscenities, grabbed at the flags, tossing one to the ground halting the vehicle.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZU9r00z7jOQ
After viewing “ALL” the evidence I can see why Navarrette has been wagging the dog so hard. If I were him I would be embarrassed to be “Mexican American” too if that meant being associated with the “Disobedient brats” and protesters who in their response to the small incident were “no martyrs for freedom”.
In my opinion the -American moniker needs to be retired. You need to either choose to be an American or go back to the country you came from.
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Val says:
May 24th, 2010
7:23 am
They want “respect”? Well, they’ve totally lost mine, and my sympathy, too. That pretty much said it all. “It’s all about Mexico!” “We have a right to celebrate our ‘national’ holiday!” (as though by donning t-shirts with American flags, someone had forcibly prevented them from exercising that “right”?) “This is our country” (while waving a Mexican flag).
If you want respect, you earn it by showing respect for your adopted country. You keep waving your loyalty to Mexico in the faces of Americans (no hyphen) and you’ll get the same contempt you’re giving.
For the record, this is the United States of America. Go ahead and celebrate you holiday and your ‘heritage’ if you wish, but here there is no day of the year that is inappropriate to display an American flag.
Thanks, Mike! I’ll be sharing this with some of my friends and colleagues.
CheriVNB says:
May 25th, 2010
12:39 am
Did you expect better? They were educated (at least partially) in California Public schools. The difference between being able to show pride of heritage, which they were and expecting everyone to applaud and support you has nothing to do with being treated equally. Critical thinking in CA schools means calling people out for their fashion faux pas.
Kurt says:
May 25th, 2010
5:48 pm
Some one once pointed out a long time ago, that when the US entered WW2, there were not any Irish-Americans, nor any German-Americans, nor any French-Americans, nor any of the other -Americans. They were all Americans. They might have come from France, or Ireland, or Germany, or where ever else, but they were no longer citizens of the old country, they were Americans. And some of them were now fighting tooth and nail against people from the country of their ancestors, and doing their best to win against them. Because they were Americans, not -Americans.
Now don’t get me wrong. If you’re Mexican, I don’t hate you. If you’re Cuban, I don’t hate you. As far as I’m concerned, the US government needs to fix our immigration system. It also needs to fix a lot of other things, mainly by leaving them alone instead of trying to fix. I think that immigration should be opened up some, within reason. I think we need to guard against undesirables such as terrorists and drug runners, but those who just want to work hard and create a better life for themselves, and contributing to the whole in the process, should be allowed in, even if only on a probationary type trial to prove themselves. This isn’t a popular view of things right now I know, but this is how our system worked for so long in the past, and new blood added vitality.
However, if you are from another country and dislike this country enough to disrespect it like this, go home. I have been in other countries on July 4th. Americans celebrated. They did NOT disrespect their host country in such a fashion.
We can look in the mirror though to see who is responsible. We keep sending politicians to offices that can’t seem to keep a promise, and tarnish the image of this country. Sad really.
Oldmanriver says:
May 28th, 2010
7:41 am
I have little sympathy for either side in this story. It reminds me a lot of the protestant vs catholic parades in Northern Ireland. All sides excercising their right to be idiots.
Linda Brady Traynham says:
May 31st, 2010
3:24 pm
We’ve already got the right bumper sticker: “America: love it or leave it.” Let’s call those people what they are: rapacious invaders here for idiotic handouts. Texans and the descendants of those who have lived here for a couple of hundred years–and much less, of course–get along just fine. They are valued members of our community, speak English, own businesses, work hard, and resent the illegals just as much as we do.